11/19/2009

Dear Shari and Toby,

 Tracking sheets

When deciding on a schedule, the following guidelines may help:

1. Schedule your priorities. Your schedule is already full and now one more thing is being placed on it to do on a regular basis. This cannot be done over a long haul without poor results in one of the areas. Most of us go through life prioritizing our schedule. We start with the first activity to be identified and place it on our calendars and follow up with the next request of our time in the same manner. I have done this most of my life, as most people, on a first come first served basis. Realizing a few years ago that my time was getting shorter and much of what I want to do is not getting done, I subconsciously began to schedule my priorities by putting the things in order of priority (not necessarily external activities but personal tasks as well as outside requests) and allotting time for personal requirements. I began with getting a reasonable amount of sleep each night. Other personal allotments have been added over the years. I have found it easier and more enjoyable to routinely schedule personal time than to wait for it to occur spontaneously.   Not scheduling personal time may be more fun at first. But, in this accelerated world of today, the disappearance of the personal time spot is the result as outside requests replace little portions of it. Only by scheduling our priority tasks first and then scheduling the gaps, can the needed time be guarded against erosion and eventual disappearance. Another view point presents a clear picture of: if our health is a top priority and we have an attitude that we want to maintain it, we will take the time to prepare a plan and give the activities of the plan the priority necessary to be successful. To look at it from a third view point asks the following question: If I view planning and exercising as work and choose doing other things more relaxing, am I too lazy to live well? I understand that all of us have shaved our personal time to a minimum in order to benefit other’s needs and care for our loved ones. If we help now only to age ungracefully or become ill in the short term, who benefits? We should try to maintain our health so we are available and willing to help others now and later. This way of living will require a significant change in attitudes and priorities. This is the first step toward wholeness.

2. Make the schedule reasonable. Start with a schedule you know you can maintain over the long haul. Many of the illnesses you now have will diminish or disappear in a short time. Maintenance of your health with a different set of exercises and diets will replace the ones you are now planning. These attitudes and habits will become the normal reflex to daily living and part of your life that will be longer than your life will be without them. Prepare a plan that you can live with.

3. Don’t be too cheap to buy the books/equipment/food you need to follow through on the treatments. The cost of health care has risen at a much faster rate than inflation. Doctors charge enormous fees to pay for their malpractice insurance. This is a direct result of the large numbers of frivolous malpractice lawsuits. The cost has become so great that the out-of-pocket expense, after insurance, for an illness is still more than the cost of preventative home treatment.

The following tracking sheets are for guidance in preparing your own.

TRACKING SHEETS.htm